Barby Keel has run an animal sanctuary for 54 years. Now 82 she and 25 volunteers look after 600 animals and every day there are – sometimes surprising – arrivals.

My animals always come first. If I won the lottery four times I still wouldn't leave them.

Barby Keel

Barby Keel is using a teaspoon to deliver small sips of milk into the tiny upturned beak of a fluffy seagull chick that was handed to her by a member of the public who noticed that its wing had been injured.

"He's going straight to the vet as soon as he's had some nourishment," she says.

Such an act is all in a day's work for Barby, a vibrant 82, as she has run an animal sanctuary near Bexhill, East Sussex, for the past 54 years. She sold her car and her life insurance policy to fund it in the early days and has never taken a proper holiday since.

"I went to France for the day once in 1975," she laughs. "My animals always come first. If I won the lottery four times I still wouldn't leave them."

"When injured seagulls like this one are strong enough to be released they go in our pen with an escape hatch," she says cheerfully.

"They can only get out when they are fit enough. They leave quite happily but every morning 300 to 400 of them come back for breakfast. We feed them with 16 loaves of bread broken into tiny pieces."

Barby with some of the many animals she has rescued (Image: STEVE REIGATE)

The sanctuary is also home to countless rabbits, rats, mice and hamsters - all evacuees from local children's bedrooms.

The Barby Keel Animal Sanctuary's "no destruction" policy means that it is often the last resort for many of these animals.

If they cannot be re-homed permanently they are assured security with Barby and her team of 25 volunteers who somehow cope with a daily influx of new animals.

"It's a revolving door, two will leave and six will come in," she says. New animals turn up at an average rate of seven a day - although one memorable day saw the arrival of no fewer than 35 cats.

"This man was lovely but he had barricaded himself into his rented house and wouldn't let anyone take his cats, apart from me - I'm well known in this part of the country.

If the animals cannot be re-homed they are assured security with Barby and her team (Image: STEVE REIGATE)

"He wasn't looking after himself, although the cats were well provided for, and he was being forced to get rid of them so we quickly adjusted one of our big sheds to make it suitable for the cats to live in together.

"What he didn't tell us was that he had kept one mum with kittens so the following year we got another 15."

One day earlier this month Barby re-homed three cats but received nine new rescues.

"Every day someone rings in tears saying their landlord says they've got to get rid of them. It's maddening."

It was precisely this sort of inflexible attitude that led Barby - who likes to bomb around her 12-acre sanctuary by quad bike - to buy her patch of land in the first place at the age of 28.

Related articles

As a war baby, who grew up with a "difficult" mother and a gentle, animal-mad father, caring for animals was ingrained. "My dad was hopeless," she says fondly.

"If he saw something looking sadly at him in a pet shop window he'd rescue it. That's where I get it from. I'd grown up watching him treat animals with such love and devotion that it was ingrained within me to do the same."

One day he decided to rescue a bush baby, another month it was a monkey: "Which was very helpful - I had it in my flat in Eastbourne with a load of budgies." Barby also had two dogs in her 20s and the tipping point came when she had enough of being told where in the town she couldn't take them.

"Eventually I snapped and realised I had to get away from there so I decided to buy a bit of land and move there with my dad, my partner at the time and our small menagerie."

Before too long she found herself taking in strays. "There was a kennel next door in those days and one day a soldier turned up with a dog called Cat. The kennel was closed so he knocked on the door and asked if I could look after her. She stayed a year until he returned for her. Anyway, after she trotted after me, not him, we did a deal that I could keep her."

Baby Keel when she was 28-year-old (Image: STEVE REIGATE)

From those small beginnings the sanctuary grew steadily as Barby's reputation for sheltering abandoned creatures began to spread. As time went on she built enclosures, pathways, pens and more fencing - and bought more land as the variety of animals under her wing increased.

"My soft heart and inability to turn away a suffering creature means that I have now fostered thousands of animals of all descriptions," says Barby, a breast cancer survivor.

Her sanctuary gained charitable status in 2002 and she faces an immense challenge raising its monthly £10,000 running costs. She is kept afloat by her local charity shop, the artwork she creates, bequests and an annual fete.

She is also gifted cut-price animal feed by suppliers and has co-written three books about some of her most moving case studies. The latest is published this week.

However even after five decades the manner in which some animals arrive still breaks her heart. "Every day I see animals that have suffered the worst kind of neglect - having been starved, beaten and abandoned by humans. And yet every day I see my staff and helpers nursing and protecting these same animals. Feeding them, exercising them and cuddling them back to health."

It is both the worst and best of human nature but one incident proved unforgettable for the wrong reasons. This was the day a member of staff saw a young mother dumping a cat in a black swing bin by the gate. Barby confronted her but she wouldn't meet her eye.

"You wouldn't put your baby in a bin so why a cat?" yelled Barby, who admits she can be hottempered. "I couldn't wrap my head around how someone could put a cat in a bin but at least she'd brought it to safety."

To order Gabby: The Little Dog That Had To Learn To Bark by Barby Keel (Trapeze, £7.99) call The Express Bookshop with credit/ debit card details on 01872 562310.

Alternatively send a cheque with your details to Gabby Offer, PO Box 200, Falmouth TR11 4WJ or buy online at www.expressbookshop.co.uk UK Delivery is free. To find out more about the work of the charity see barbykeel.btck.co.uk The sanctuary opens to the public on Sunday afternoons between 2pm and 5pm from April until early October.